1. Diffusion
Diffusion: process by which an idea or innovation is transmitted from one group or individual to another
Cultural Hearth: point of origin
Carriers: those conditions that assist the transmission of ideas
Barriers: any conditions that hinder the flow of people or information
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2. Types of Diffusion Relocation Diffusion Expansion Diffusion
Group of people move and take their culture with them
Examples?
Expansion Diffusion
Information about an innovation or idea may spread throughout society
Things being diffused remain, and often intensify, in the originating region
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3. Types of Diffusion cont.
Contagious Diffusion
Depends on direct contact
Strongly influenced by distance
Distance decay – intensity of an idea or innovation decreases as distance increases
Examples?
Hierarchical Diffusion
Transferring ideas first between larger places or prominent people and only later to smaller or less important points or people
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4. generally through trade.
Cultural diffusion is the spread of elements of one culture to another people,
generally through trade.
Take the spread of writing. Similarities between the pictograms of Egyptian hieroglyphics, Sumerian cuneiform, and the Indus script are striking. .

5. Religions of the World: Diffusion in Action

6. Now, it’s your turn…
In a group, come up with at least 2 examples of each type of diffusion that your group can share with the class.
Examples are all around you in our culture.

7. Arabia Before Muhammad
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8. THE ARABS: During ancient times, the Arabs inhabited much of the area from the Arabian peninsula to the Euphrates River.
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9. POLITICAL AND RELIGIOUS FEATURES: The Arab world in the early 7th century had no stable, large-scale political entities. People belonged to close-knit clans, or extended families, that formed tribes. Most Arabs were pagans, but small minorities were Jewish and Christian.
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10. ECONOMIC COMPONENTS: Bedouins Farmers Traders
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11. BEDOUINS (nomadic pastoralists) provided for their own needs with:
Herds of sheep & goats
Small-scale trading in towns
Regular raids on one another and on caravans.
Arabs = nomadic bedouins, Semitic speaking people who lived in Arabian Peninsula
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Hostile surroundings made the Arabs move constantly to continue to feed their animals
Arabs organized into independent tribes to help each other with difficult lives
Sheikh = leader of tribe
Early Arabs herded sheep & farmed on the Arabian peninsula
After domestication of camel, expanded caravan trade from between Persian gulf & Mediterranean

12. Bedouins Day 2 – In Class Video “Empire of Faith”
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14. FARMERS: Some farmers worked the land, but in many areas soils were too poor and rain was too infrequent to support agriculture.
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15. TRADERS: Cities supported those who carried luxury goods from the Indian Ocean region & southern Arabia along caravan routes to the cities of the eastern Mediterranean. They formed the economic & political elite of Arabia - they led the tribes.
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Luxury goods = (spices, incense, perfumes)

16. Pre-Islamic Trade Routes
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17. MECCA was the most important trade center in Arabia
MECCA was the most important trade center in Arabia. It was dominated by the powerful tribe of the Quraysh (KOOR-aysh).
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18. THE KAABA: Mecca was also the location of the shrine known as the Kaaba, founded according to Arab tradition by Abraham. For centuries people from all over Arabia had made pilgrimages to Mecca to visit the Kaaba, site of a huge black meteorite.
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Early Arabs were polytheistic, Allah = main god
Traced their ancestry to Abraham & his son Ishmael, who were believed to have built a shrine called the Kaaba at Mecca
Black Stone, cornerstone of Kaaba, revered for its association with Abraham

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20. Muhammad ( )
EARLY LIFE: Muhammad was born in 570 to a respectable though not wealthy or powerful clan of the Quraysh tribe. His father died before he was born, his mother shortly afterward, leaving Muhammad under the care of his grandparents and uncle.
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21. CARAVAN TRADE: Like many young Meccans, he entered the caravan trade
CARAVAN TRADE: Like many young Meccans, he entered the caravan trade. By the time he was 30, he had a reputation for competence and honesty, and so became financial adviser to a wealthy Quraysh widow, Kahdija (KAH-dee-ah).
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22. MARRIAGE: Although older than Muhammad, Khadija became his wife in 596, and they had a loving marriage until her death. She bore him three sons (all died in childhood) and four girls (all survived). Only one daughter, Fatima, lived after him.
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23. Day 2 – In Class Video “Empire of Faith”
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24. An unquestioned belief in one God, Allah
THE REVELATIONS: A man of spiritual insight, Muhammad received in 610 the first of many revelations that commanded him to teach all people a new faith that called for:
An unquestioned belief in one God, Allah
A deep commitment to social justice
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25. TEACHING IN MECCA: Muhammad began teaching in Mecca, but he converted few people outside his own circle.
Meccans feared that his new faith might call into question the legitimacy of the shrines in Mecca and jeopardize the traditional pilgrimages to the Kaaba with their accompanying trade.
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26. FLIGHT TO MEDINA: At this point, citizens from Medina, a smaller trading community troubled by dissension, asked Muhammad to become their leader. The journey from Mecca to Medina is called the Hijra (HEEZH-rah) and the event was seen as so important that 622 is the year in which the Islamic calendar begins.
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27. UNITY: In Medina, Muhammad gathered around him a large community of believers. This group was to become the foundation of the Islamic state. The substitution of faith for blood ties was able to unite rival Arab tribes and bring about political unity.
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28. RETURN TO MECCA: Although Muhammad was fully in control in Medina, Mecca remained the focus of his attention. Its political and economic importance were critical to his desire to convert all of Arabia.
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29. ATTACKS ON MECCAN CARAVANS: Therefore, his followers began attacking Meccan caravans and battled with the Meccans several times in the 620s. In 630, Muhammad and many of his followers returned to Mecca in triumph.
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30. UNITED ARAB WORLD: After making local arrangements, he returned to Medina and set about winning over the Bedouins of the Arabian desert. When Muhammad died in 632, he had converted most of the Arab world.
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31. MUHAMMAD’S TEACHING People were asked to surrender completely to Allah, the one true God. The surrender is known as al- Islam.)
Those who surrendered became Muslims and joined the umma muslima – a new kind of community.
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